MEMOIR: THE YEARS OF THE SARUS

 

Free to anyone who writes to me (Email).

IN BETHLEHEM

It is my younger son who keeps the stable now -

I am too old, my knees - what of the elder?

Aiee, you press on a wound there.

Ben Nechama I named the younger.  The Lord

gave him to me for consolation.

Aiee, that was a dreadful day.

Merciless, they slew him, not two he was -

torn from his mother's arms.  By whom?

Herod's men - nay, I speak it low -

It was the strangers - from eastern lands they say -

wise men.  Not wise enough

to keep from Herod what they sought.

Followed a moving star, they said,

to find the new-born king. 

Herod had no cub then.  He called the scholars

“What's all this?” he asked, menacing.

They knew, Herod knew, the true king

must come of David's line.

"In Bethlehem", they said, "Micah foretold it".

"Go find this infant king", Herod told the wise men

"then come and tell me".

They never came back.  Our sons paid the price...

all boys of two or less.

For naught, some say.  A boy was got away

the night the wise men left.

 

That was a strange thing....

His father was of David's line,

a carpenter.  Come down from Galilee -

the census drew them all - and his wife.

Pale, in much pain.

She was with child, her time upon her.

Not a bed in the town.

"Let them shelter in the stable",

the innkeeper said, pitying them.  I too.

We made a bed of hay, the man and I;

the innkeeper sent his wife,

another came with water - women's things.

It seemed the sky had more stars, so bright it was.

I remember there came at first a child's cry within

and then the music... Not of this earth, I deem -

it seemed to fall from the stars...

 

The man came out, stood silent.

"The Lord has blessed you", I said, "is it a boy?"

He nodded, then led me in.

With shining eyes, his wife looked on her child:

a morsel laid by her side.

Feeling eyes upon me I turned.

Every beast was gazing at him,

even the roosting hens,

on the swaddled babe whose small mouth pursed

and blew, moving as in speech.  I thought

"He will be a preacher", and laughed within.

 

In the hour past midnight came the sound of feet,

and muted bleating.  Shepherds!

Some are good, some not; these watched over

the Temple’s flocks.  They came, said the oldest,

to see – was there a newborn babe within?

“This is a stable,” said I.  “True, but he said –”

“Who said?”  He looked me in the eye

“It was an angel” – “an army of angels”

piped up a lad.  “Yes, a host, singing -

such songs you never heard.  ‘I bring tidings of joy’,

the leader said, ‘in Bethlehem this night

is born the Saviour, Mashiach, the Son of God.

Go seek a newborn laid in a manger.’

And the sky was filled with angels singing.”

He looked up as though he heard them still.

“Is he within?”  Silenced, I stepped aside, let them in:

shuffling feet, softly bleating lambs.

 

The census over, all who had come went home,

all but the carpenter from Galilee.

He opened a shop; they remained, wife, son, and he.

Until the wise men came.  Then they were gone.

Suddenly.  Before the slaughter of all our lambs.

The town was desolate, the hamlets around.

All our sons gone, yet the one was never found.

Aiee, stranger, you have stirred sorrow buried deep –

and the one who was promised; angels singing,

stars, and wise men journeying –

where is the Son of David?  Romans rule us still.

 

“I come to bring you news of him, news of joy:

he preaches a new life, and the Almighty is with him,

for he has cured every sickness, cast out demons

healed lepers, made the blind see, the deaf hear,

the lame walk.  He forgives sins.  The dead have risen

at his command.  His teaching has set us free.

Such is the power goes forth from him

a Roman declared his faith –” A Roman?

“A centurion whose body slave lay sick;

‘I am not worthy,’ he said ‘that you should come

under my roof; speak but the word

and my servant shall be healed.’

The word was spoken, the servant was healed.

Our Master wondered that in all Israel such faith

he had not found.  So lift up your head, your heart

old man.  Come to the babe grown to man’s state.

Hear my tidings of joy, though I do not sing,

come to Mashiach, Son of David, our King.”

© 2023 by Ruth Heredia  between two Sundays of Advent, 2023

 Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

 

BULBULNAMA

Ten year old piece meant for blog but forgotten.

Early in the morning of 9 April 2010, just before dawn, a bright and bubbly “Pleased to meet you” woke her up. It was the bulbul, now come to stay. All day he flew about the compounds, ‘hers’ and those of the neighbouring flats, singing whole sentences, varied with phrases and the occasional exclamation. He had only to speak and she must smile or laugh, so infectious was his blithesomeness.

And then she saw he had a mate. They inspected a tall shrub, almost a tree, within sight of her balcony, but it was a place where three cats patrolled the wall. Where the bulbuls finally nested she did not know, and that year saw no increase in their family.

The bulbul sang all day from 6 to 6 as if he had to relate the whole history of the world in a single day. She wondered if the female's was the voice with the more limited repertoire and unlike the irresistible round bobbing vibratoful voice of her mate, as fat, round and bobbing as he was. Oh, if they should succeed in raising a family and starting a colony - it would be bliss, sheer bliss this side of heaven. The picture he made one morning in the brilliant sunshine, perched on a leafless magenta-flowered branch of bougainvillea, up on the roof-garden in the neighbouring apartment block, was like a Japanese silk scroll painting. No camera could capture that image, only a painter using glowing colours on a piece of cream-gold silk might succeed.

She set out a bird-bath for them. The naughty birds ignored it, even in the scorching heat of May. Some days they went foraging quite far, so that she only heard them in the morning and at sunset. But on the best days – for her – they conversed as they darted from bush to shrub to tree, picking off insects. The female spoke in low tones, very plain; he sang his songs inside out and upside down, varying them like a little whiskery bird-Bach.

They nested quite late, in July the following year (2011). In a while another friendly flat-dweller reported seeing three or more bulbuls in a group but it was only in October that three were sighted from the spare bedroom’s balcony.  Papa bulbul had grown quite accustomed to her attending to the plants in the balconies, or to the washing on the line. He perched on the lamp-post opposite her, cocking his head to observe with bright beady eye, and sang to utterly distract her. But when he visited the music-room balcony, as her sister gave a piano lesson, he silently watched, listened – and investigated the shiny scarlet berries on the ‘squirrel-tail’ asparagus fern.

The youngster was quite well grown by October, and in due course flew away to be part of another family. The parent birds were now as much a part of her own family’s lives as the rising and setting of the sun. As for the bulbuls, they seemed to agree that these great monsters were quite harmless, even friendly.

For a while afterwards the bulbuls readily flew into the plant-crammed balconies, twittering, chirruping, singing, and swinging and bouncing on the sturdier plants, having a high old time. On one occasion they perched on a clothesline, either side of her shower-cap, highly excited as they poked at it and discussed whether it was edible or not. On another occasion, as she was watering the plants, one of them miscalculated its flight from the shrub outside to the grille and flew almost into her face, missing her nose by the thickness of a feather. It turned instantly in flight and perched on the grille, watching her. She murmured very low and carried on watering while it watched quite unafraid.

The family never squealed or made sudden movements, and there may have been some emanation of their good will that reached the bulbuls, because they seemed to trust them and like to drop in.

One day the black and white cat was harassing them, bent on catching one. And, unknown to the sisters, they had their sole surviving fledgling with them, a very young thing. She heard a lot of bird talk in the balcony of the spare bedroom while her sister was in its attached bathroom. Glancing in (without her glasses) she saw a bulbul fly right into the room seconds before her sister emerged, luckily facing her. She signalled to her and her sister signalled back for her camera which happened to be on the sideboard just next to her. In (human) silence she took pictures while the other two birds flew about distractedly from balcony to balcony, calling for the third.

Not having glasses on she had no idea that it was Baby bulbul who had flown in, and her sister only gave her a clue after the baby flew back across the room smack into the window, through whose glass the parents could be seen. Coaxing it gently, her sister opened the window, and the brave/ sensible little chap or chapess didn't waste energy flapping about in a tizzy, but sat quietly on the sill while the window was opened. Very slowly it made its way out on to a pot and, encouraged by the parents outside her sister speaking very low and gently within, flew on to the grille.

In a trice all three were gone. But they came by in the evening for their usual plant examination, which meant that they were not frightened at all by the adventure.

If the Queen of England or the President of India had come visiting they would be regarded as a nuisance but the bulbuls' visit was a great honour. Apparently only one little baby survives the cats and the crows each year. That's the price the bulbuls pay for living in a city.

From 4^th to 5^th April 2013, Emir Bulbuli & Lady Bulbulina scouted for a place to nest and decided on a set of dried bougainvillea branches often used at Christmas and otherwise stored in a pedestal cachepot at some height, in the balcony of the music room. They raided moss-sticks in the other balconies, picked wisps of cotton wool from a piece set out for them, and built the nest from 6^th to 10^th April. From the 11^th to the 13^th, Bulbulina laid 3 eggs, one each day, and began to hatch them. 

Istanbul was the first hatchling, emerging on the 23^rd. Bullion followed early on the 24^th, and BulDozer late the same day.

On 3 May: “Cheep chweep fweep! Don't we grow fast? Today we are an average of 10 days old." Turning their backs on the giant bipeds, are Istanbul (right), Bullion (left) and BulDozer (in the middle, squashed by the other two). The first-born is hogging half the nest. And the littlest was sat upon by his siblings, Now comes the really dangerous part. Istanbul will be the first to try his wings. May he not become a crow's snack.

Perished, 6 May.

© 2023 by Ruth Heredia

 Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

GOLDEN CORD

O Jesus my Lord

We are bound by the cord

Of your love and mine

That do entwine

And will not part.

For not your heart

Nor mine, though it be small,

Will let go, nor little nor all

Of our so mingled love.

Not for all the stars above

Will I be reft of thine

Nor grudge thee aught of mine. 

 

© 2023 by Ruth Heredia

 Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

 

ANNUNCIATION

 Repeating, for its relevance and timeliness, an old post.

At the Incarnation,
Heaven and earth in little space
became one, as the English early Tudor hymn (ca 1420) puts it.

Yet, the Incarnation began nine months earlier, in a happening rich with significance for a Christian life.

Probably the truest, therefore the best, representation of that moment is the painting of the Annunciation by an artist of no great fame, Domenico Veneziano.

In a bare room, without a prie-dieu or a prayer-book, the angel and Mary face each other. That she is hortus conclusus, an enclosed garden, is implied by the wall around the garden, whose door is shut. The path from it has no footprint.

There is no dove descending in a ray of light. The angel genuflects even as his hand betokens a request. With crossed arms, Mary bows as though sheltering the One who is within. She has already spoken her “Behold the handmaid of the Lord”; already the Lord who sought her acquiescence has found in her his “little space”.

It is a moment of heart-stopping mystical wonder, beauty, and love. Love, humility and obedience, without which there is no Christian life. In Judaeo-Christian tradition, the brightest angel, whose mind was nearest to God’s, fell, “like lightning from Heaven,” as Jesus once said, because he would not bend the knee to any of humankind. They were, as he judged, inferior to angels. He would not do it from obedience, nor even for love, and humility was unknown to the one who became The Adversary.

If the room is bare of material things, it is brimful of love, humility (“let it be done to me,” says Mary, NOT “I accept”), and obedience: in Mary and the angel, and in the One who is unseen but present already in Mary’s womb.

The hymn concludes:
Leave we all this worldly mirth,
And follow we this joyful birth;
    Transeamus.

ANNUNCIATION by DOMENICO VENEZIANO

The maiden was at her prayers,
silent, removed
from garden path and barrèd door.

No whisper of wing, no footprint on path,
Gabriel kneels before her,
wondrous greeting giving;
bringing the Word to her open heart.

In time she will bring forth
the Timeless One, incarnate.
But now in a quiet corner
she bows to her God within,
and the angel kneels to both.

©2012 by Ruth Heredia

  

Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

POEMS FROM THE PAST

 

DREAMSCAPE

Stones, ancient stones,

bones of old earth she sat on,

Leaning against them while

Into the wine-dark sea

A molten sun sank.

 

Silence and darkness,

darkness and silence;

No god spoke here at Sounion,

No bard, nor hero - but

Their shadows never left her,

Companionable shades,

Leaning on staff or spear,

As she leaned against the columns,

Looking to seas uncharted

And lands as yet unknown.

© 12 August 2010 by Ruth Heredia

Dear Birje

This morning, early, an imprudent action dislocated my right thumb. Ah well, I have four fingers and a mind; my niece said "apricot" (I don't quite know why) & outside the bulbul was going through his new song (last year it was "pleased to meet you"). This followed:

DAYDREAM

Apricot days, give me apricot days,

And cerulean skies,

With breezes snapping laundry,

Ringing carillons on chimes,

Lucent leaves, blossoms glowing,

And a bulbul who just

Wants to dance,

Wants to dance,

Wants to dance with me!

© 8 June 2011 by Ruth Heredia

 

&

REFLECTION

 Light and colour,

Music and motion,

How little have I prized you,

Given unstintingly, nigh all my days,

And now shall I rue

The slowing down,

The blur, the failure,

Who took all as my due?

No, rather shall I give praise

For the days that remain,

And a bulbul’s song

The day long,

In all weathers!

 © 8 June 2011 by Ruth Heredia

About ten days ago there was this:

FIGURE OF EIGHT

Words enigmatic,

ecstatic,

mostly in music

- trad or mod –

make a poem.

How so? Try it.

 © 28 May 2011 by Ruth Heredia

Heaven knows what it means, but it's in 3 sets of 8 beats, and the last line is the cadence.

This sudden flow of words makes me feel quite dizzy. But, to paraphrase Edmundo Ros the Calypso Man, it feels so good to feel so - dizzy!

 Reply from Dr. Birjepatil:

Your delicate word play is as delightful as ever.

I admire the surefooted way you move from line to chiseled line.

I enjoyed all three seemingly 'effortless' efforts as much as the Calypso man would have done.

Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

TO VERMEER written 16 years ago

 TO VERMEER

Like a long-legged fly upon the stream

His mind moves upon silence. (W.B. Yeats)

Mynheer Vermeer, my dear Jan,

What is the secret of your stillness?

Such a stillness,

Suspending time for a spellbound moment –

Only a moment in the lives you painted.                                                             

Ah, the richness of the light, the textures;

Ah, how palpable each person and each object.

If I heed not that rucked up carpet I shall trip

And fall – in silence – on the cold, tiled floor.

There are dust motes dancing soundless in the sunlight;

Smells of cooking, and of polish, soap and ‘baccy.

But a moment, and the sounds will snap back:

Breathing,  laughter,  music,  splashing milk.

 

              

If that were all, you’d only be a conjuror.

Others have learned your skills,

Though none quite matched ‘em.

But you, dear sir, make it seem so important,

That mundane moment in an ordinary life.

What does it signify?  Why am I entranced,

All the present cast away as I focus,

In each freeze frame seeking – illumination?

Illumination!  O magician of the luminous

What do I seek?  What will you tell me,

Limning words on the canvas with your paintbrush,

Like the long-legged fly upon the stream,

In silence?

 © 14 May 2007 by Ruth Heredia

Comment by J. Birjepatil: How did you manage to get those lovely Vermeer pictures transcribed so perfectly to the computer screen? Three cheers for camera obscura. They are ravishing and the accompanying passages might have sprung from the master of light and shadows himself. The way the text and the visuals disseminate in your work reminds me of W G Sebald's writing but he is gloomy and you are anything but.

Posted in honour of the once-in-a-lifetime exhibition at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

Ruth Heredia is the originator and holds the copyright to all material on this blog unless credited to some source. Please do not use it or pass it off as your own work. That is theft. If you wish to link it, quote it, or reprint in whole or in part, please be courteous enough to seek my permission.

 Anyone who would like a PDF copy of the following titles, has only to email me. A message here will reach me, and I will delete it - to protect your email address - as soon as I make a note of that.